Let’s break this down into what you are trying to achieve:
- Most of my students want to achieve conversational French, which means:
– being able to talk about oneself and giving personal opinions without hesitation: je
– being able to talk to one person at a time (their significant other, members of their family, their French friend, etc. – not a complete stranger): you (tu)
– being able to talk about this person and them, about what two people do: we
– being able to talk about other people, commenting on someone else: he, she, you (vous), they
This is what I put much of my focus on, to help people get speaking as soon as possible, without needing much notion of French grammar. - You might be interested in learning for pleasure. In this case, I would recommend:
– learning how to read the way French children do, starting with combining vowels:
a+i = ai = /è/ sound
a+u = au = /o/ sound
o+i = oi = /wa/ sound
o+u = ou = /oo/ sound
– using bilingual material, to learn ‘by reading’ and focusing on what is common between English and French, and what is different.
What is common:
– vocabulary with typical endings (-aire, -eur, etc.)
– word order, except for pronouns (I + love + you = Je + t’ + aime)
– most tenses, except for passé composé/imparfait and use of subjunctive
What isn’t:
– vocabulaire when it comes to ‘false friends’ (monnaie = change, currency # money = argent)
– homophones: the sound /mètr/ could be maître, mettre or even mètre (one meter long)
– ‘se’ verbs: se réveiller, for all tenses: je me suis réveillé / je me réveille / je vais me réveiller
– past tenses (use of passé composé/imperfect)
– use of subjunctive
– sentence structure and choice of words (I didn’t expect you to come – Je ne m’attendais pas à te voir)
Leave a comment below if you’re in one of these situations, or if your objectives are different!
Bonne chance 🙂